John-Patrick Smith

John-Patrick Tracey Smith^[1]

John-Patrick at the 2015 Wimbledon qualifying tournament
Country (sports)	Australia
Residence	Townsville, Queensland
Born	(1989-01-24) 24 January 1989 Townsville, Queensland
Height	188 cm
Turned pro	July 2011
Plays	Left-handed (two-handed backhand)
Prize money	$510,604
Singles
Career record	3–9 (ATP Tour and Grand Slam main draws, and in Davis Cup)
Career titles	0
Highest ranking	No. 108 (28 September 2015)
Current ranking	No. 132 (1 February 2016)
Grand Slam Singles results
Australian Open	1R (2013)
French Open	Q2 (2015)
Wimbledon	1R (2015)
US Open	1R (2015)
Doubles
Career record	13–20 (ATP Tour and Grand Slam main draws, and in Davis Cup)
Career titles	0
Highest ranking	No. 68 (17 March 2014)
Current ranking	No. 314 (1 February 2016)
Grand Slam Doubles results
Australian Open	2R (2013)
French Open	1R (2013)
Wimbledon	2R (2013, 2014)
US Open	1R (2014)
Last updated on: 3 February 2016.

John-Patrick Tracey "JP" Smith (born 24 January 1989) is an Australian professional tennis player who competes mainly on the ATP Challenger Tour, both in singles and doubles. He attended the University of Tennessee from 2007 through 2011 where he was a four-time All-American and made it to the college No. 1 ranking in both singles and doubles.^[1]

Smith reached his highest ATP singles ranking of No. 108 on September 28, 2015, and his highest ATP doubles ranking of No. 68, on 17 March 2014. In July 2015, Smith won his maiden ATP tour match defeating fellow Aussie Bernard Tomic in the first round of the Hall of Fame Championships in Newport.^[2] He went on to reach the semifinals.

College career

Knoxville became Smith's home away from home when he enrolled at the University of Tennessee in August 2007. It was on those campus' hard courts that he became one of the most prolific athletes in Tennessee and Intercollegiate Tennis Association history.

Coached by Sam Winterbotham and American former tennis star Chris Woodruff, Smith became a mainstay in the college top 10 in singles and doubles while helping the Volunteers to their best four-year period in program history. Smith played No. 1 in the singles and doubles lineups nearly his entire career. He was voted the Southeastern Conference Player of the Year in 2010 and 2011 as a junior and senior. As a team, Tennessee won the conference title both those years and reached the NCAA final in 2010. Smith eventually became the Vols' career combined wins leader with 298 (152 singles wins, 146 doubles wins).^[1]

He was consistently among the top tennis players year in, year out. He finished his career as the second player in college tennis history to earn singles and doubles ITA All-America honors all four years of his career, joining eventual world No. 1 doubles player Rick Leach of Southern California.

Smith enjoyed his best season as a junior in 2009-10. He swept the singles and doubles titles at the 2009 ITA All-American Championships, one of college tennis' "Grand Slams." His superb play during the fall's individual tournament season helped eventual propel Smith to the No. 1 national singles ranking on 17 April 2010. In addition to being ranked No. 1 in singles, he also held the No. 1 ITA national doubles ranking during portions of the 2009, 2010 and 2011 seasons. He was part of the ITA National Doubles Team of the Year with Davey Sandgren in 2009 and Boris Conkic in 2011. He reached the NCAA finals in doubles with Sandgren in 2010 and 2011.

One of Smith's major career accomplishments at Tennessee came off the court entirely. He earned his undergraduate degree in economics in May 2011. He was an academic award winner for the Vols, year in, year out. He earned an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship and was a three-time ITA Academic Scholar Athlete.^[3]

2011 SEC Athlete of the Year

A month after his college career ended, Smith became the first Vol since Peyton Manning in 1998 to be voted SEC Athlete of the Year by conference athletic directors.^[4] Other male athletes from Tennessee to earn this honor at the time included baseball star Todd Helton (1995) and football wide receiver Larry Seivers (1977).

Professional career

Smith in 2013

2012

In April, Smith won the US F11, defeating Pedro Zerbini 6-2, 6-0 in the final. In July 2012, Smith won the Winnetka Challenger against Ricardas Berankis 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 in the final. This was his first challenger title, which he also had to qualify. ^[5]

2013

In 2013, Smith competed mostly on the challenger circuit. His first title came on 25 August at the Canada F6, where he defeated Ante Pavic 3–6, 6–4, 6–3 in the final ^[6] Smith also enjoyed a successful week in Tiburon; with his quarterfinal finish he vaulted 15 spots to a new career-high ranking of No.208.

2014

Smith made the second round of qualifying before losing to Denis Kudla in straight sets. He qualified for Indian Wells but lost in round 1 to Robin Haase.

Smith made the final of the Taipei Challenger, losing to Gilles Müller 3-6, 3-6. This increased his ranking to a career high of #181. He lost in the first round of Wimbledon qualifying to Farrukh Dustov. In the two Traralgon Challengers, Smith lost in the semi final to Bradley Klahn in 1 and in the quarter final to Ben Mitchell in 2.

In December, Smith narrowly missed out on a wild-card into the 2015 Australian Open, losing in the final of the Australian play off to Jordan Thompson 1-6, 3-6, 6-1, 7-6, 7-9.

2015

Smith in 2015

Smith commenced 2015 at the inaugural Onkaparina Challenger, but lost in round one to Marcos Baghdatis. He was eliminated in the second round of qualifying for the Australian Open to compatriot Omar Jasika 7-6, 3-6, 10-12. In February, Smith headed to USA where he made the quarter final of the Dallas Challenger. He then played and qualified for the Delray Beach main draw. This was fourth ATP World Tour event for which he has qualified.^[7] He drew No.1 seed Kevin Anderson and lost in round 1. Smith lost in round 1 of qualifying for Indian Wells before returning to the Challenger tour, where he won the Drummondville Challenger over crowd favourite, Frank Dancevic. This was his second career Challenger title and first since 2012. ^[8] This win gave Smith a near career high of 163. In June, Smith secured his first Grand Slam main draw entry via qualifying for the first time in his career at Wimbledon. ^[9] He lost in round 1 to Kenny de Schepper in 5 sets, despite leading 2 sets to 0. ^[10] In July, Smith entered the Newport Championships and defeated compatriot and third seed Bernard Tomic in round one, his first win on the ATP World Tour ^[11]on the way to the semi final where he lost to eventual champion Rajeev Ram. ^[12] At the US Open, Smith qualified before losing to Mikhail Youzhny in round 1.

ATP career finals (17)

Singles (4)

Outcome	No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponents in the final	Score
Winner	1.	7 July 2012	Winnetka, United States	Hard	Ričardas Berankis	3–6, 6–3, 7–6(7–3)
Runner-up	2.	4 May 2014	Taipei, Taiwan	Carpet	Gilles Müller	3–6, 3–6
Winner	3.	22 March 2015	Drummondville, Canada	Hard	Frank Dancevic	6–7(11–13), 7–6(7–3), 7–5
Runner-up	4.	23 August 2015	Vancouver, Canada	Hard	Dudi Sela	4-6, 5-7

Doubles (13)

Outcome	No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partnering	Opponents in the final	Score
Winners	1.	4 February 2012	Burnie, Australia	Hard	John Peers	Divij Sharan Vishnu Vardhan	6–2, 6–4
Winners	2.	11 February 2012	Caloundra, Australia	Hard	John Peers	John Paul Fruttero Raven Klaasen	7–6(7–5), 6–4
Winners	3.	15 April 2012	León, Mexico	Hard	John Peers	César Ramírez Bruno Rodríguez	6–3, 6–3
Runner-up	1.	7 July 2012	Winnetka, United States	Hard	John Peers	Devin Britton Jeff Dadamo	6–1, 2–6, [6–10]
Runner-up	2.	5 August 2012	Vancouver, Canada	Hard	John Peers	Maxime Authom Ruben Bemelmans	4–6, 2–6
Winners	4.	6 October 2012	Belém, Brazil	Hard	John Peers	Nicholas Monroe Simon Stadler	6–3, 6–2
Winners	5.	4 November 2012	Charlottesville, United States	Indoor Hard	John Peers	Jarmere Jenkins Jack Sock	7–5, 6–1
Winners	6.	2 February 2013	Burnie, Australia	Hard	Ruan Roelofse	Brydan Klein Dane Propoggia	6–2, 6–2
Winners	7.	24 March 2013	Rimouski, Canada	Indoor Hard	Samuel Groth	Philipp Marx Florin Mergea	7–6 (5), 7–6 (7)
Runner-up	3.	13 April 2013	Guadalajara, Mexico	Hard	Samuel Groth	Marin Draganja Mate Pavic	7–5, 2–6, [11–13]
Runner-up	4.	21 April 2013	Mexico City, Mexico	Hard	Jordan Kerr	Carsten Ball Chris Guccione	3–6, –3, [9–11]
Runner-up	5.	5 May 2013	Anning, China	Clay	Samuel Groth	Victor Baluda Dino Marcan	7–6(7–5), 4–6, [7–10]
Winners	8.	12 May 2013	Kun-Ming, China	Hard	Samuel Groth	Go Soeda Yasutaka Uchiyama	6–4, 6–1

Singles performance timeline

Doubles performance timeline

References

External links

• John-Patrick Smith at the Association of Tennis Professionals
• John-Patrick Smith at the International Tennis Federation

Association of Tennis Professionals: Top ten Australian male singles tennis players, as of 15 February 2016 1. Bernard Tomic (20 ) 2. Nick Kyrgios (41 1) 3. John Millman (63 3) 4. Sam Groth (76 1) 5. Thanasi Kokkinakis (100 4) 6. Matthew Ebden (105 ) 7. John-Patrick Smith (135 1) 8. James Duckworth (139 ) 9. Jordan Thompson (149 3) 10. Luke Saville (184 6)

Association of Tennis Professionals: Top ten Australian male doubles tennis players, as of 1 February 2016 1. John Peers (9 1) 2. Chris Guccione (58 5) 3. Rameez Junaid (66 ) 4. Carsten Ball (122 3) 5. Sam Groth (126 3) 6. Lleyton Hewitt (136 30) 7. Matt Reid (137 1) 8. Nick Kyrgios (162 3) 9. Andrew Whittington (176 52) 10. Matthew Ebden (195 8)